Series 1 > Loyall dissuasive

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THE LOYALL DISSUASIVE
and on its little isle of Hy, ‘ Iona.’ Here through Clan Lome
there was a primitive religious settlement before St. Columba
arrived.
Bruide, the lion of the north, slumbered at Dores near Inver¬
ness, but in 560 he awoke. The ease with which the Dalriads
had advanced northwards was equalled by the rapidity of their
retreat, and they shrank back into Kintyre. Gabran, the grand¬
son of Fergus, was slain. The men of Cinel Loarn were the
screen of the retreating forces, and when things were adjusted,
they reoccupied with elasticity their old ground under the
indulgence of the good-natured Piet. Meanwhile in Ireland
their kindred were making great strides. Learning, mis¬
sionary zeal, monastic foundation, were rising, and the saints
were not few in number. Tribal kingdoms, and Tara itself,
had Christian monarchs supported by ecclesiastics, many of
whom were saints. Columba was forward in all these relation¬
ships of Church and State, of religion, learning, monasticism.
The woes of Scottish Dalriada reached him, as they reached
all his kin. There is always on sensitive scales an allowance
made for possible dust, and among the higher motives which
made Columba the missionary to Scotland we are constrained
to admit the earthly one given in the Prophecy qfBerchan :
c Woe to the Cruthnigh to whom he will go eastward.
He knew the thing that is.
Nor was it happy with him that an Erinach
Should be king in the east under the Cruthnigh.’
St. Columba arrived to support Conall, successor of Gabran,
in 563. After trying Loch Killisport for a resting-place,
through the friendly relationships of Cinel Loarn with the
natives, Piets and Scots, Columba at length took up his home
in Iona, and prepared for his Christian campaign against the
Pagan Piets. From whatever cause, the relationships between
these two Celtic peoples, though strained and warlike from
time to time, had always social affinities which made religious
approaches easy. There was no real martyrdom in Scotland